


Doppelganger

by Severina



Category: Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Genre: Community: smallfandomfest, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-08-01
Packaged: 2018-07-28 13:36:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7642723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's all big bushy hair and sparkling teeth and retro Star Wars shirt faded from too many washings. Matt dislikes him on sight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doppelganger

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's smallfandomfest for the prompt 'territorial'
> 
> * * *

There is some green and red bunting draped limply around a few of the desks and a Santa that's seen better days propped on top of a filing cabinet, but otherwise the squad room looks just the same as it usually does when Matt stops by. If not for the punch bowl in the corner – and the exuberant crowd of cops surrounding it – he'd never know that a Christmas party is actually going on. 

Oh. And the sign.

_It has now been 3 years since our last Christmas-related McClane Incident_

He nudges John's arm. "Three, huh?"

John's gaze follows his to the somewhat bedraggled cardboard, eyes narrowed as he eyeballs the hand-lettered '3' thumbtacked onto the board. "Gotta drag that damn thing out every year,' he grouses. "Told 'em that thing at Radio City a coupla years back had nothin' to do with me."

Matt has studied the history of McClane backwards and forwards, and he smirks now. "Wasn't your son in the building?"

"On a tour!" John says. "He was showing his new boss the sights when he just happened—"

"—to get caught up in an international incident involving sex trafficking and numbers running that ended with you crashing the afternoon performance in the middle of the big musical number and wrestling the boss of the northeastern sector of the cosa nostra amidst screaming high-kicking can-can girls and flying sequins?" 

"I was in the area," John mutters. 

"Ohhhh, McClane's here," Joe announces before Matt can point out that being 'in the area' is not necessarily a bad thing. A shit-ton of lives get saved when John McClane is 'in the area', and rebuilding the roof of the music hall after the explosion didn't cost _that_ much money.

Joe claps a hand on John's shoulder, and when he leans in Matt can tell exactly just how much he's been enjoying the punch. "Did anybody make sure the insurance on the building was all paid up?"

"I've got SWAT on stand-by!" a redhead that Matt doesn't recognize calls out.

"Laugh a minute with you jokers," John says. But the corner of his mouth turns up even when he scowls at Joe, so maybe he already knows it. He points at the plastic glass in Joe's hand. "You save any of that shit for me?"

"Pretty sure Kowalski's got an IV hookup directly into her left arm—"

"Hey, I heard that!" Connie yells.

"—so ya might wanna snag some before the boys haul her down to the drunk tank," Joe finishes smoothly. "Tell ya right now, though," he continues, gesturing broadly with the drink. "It'll put hair on your chest."

"What'd'ya say, Matt?" John asks. "Willing to risk it?"

Matt eyes the punchbowl warily. He's kind of fond of his mostly hairless torso. Moreover, John's pretty fond of it as well, if the attention he pays to it is any indication. "Maybe I'll just stick with Moun—"

"Oh hey, Detective McClane, you're here!" someone says from behind them. 

"—tain Dew," Matt finishes.

If the dude who steps around the desk is able to vote, Matt will eat his hat. That is, he would if he owned a hat. The guy nods at him awkwardly before stopping in front of them, standing maybe just a little too close. Smiling up at John like he's just seen the second coming. He's all big bushy hair and sparkling teeth and retro Star Wars shirt faded from too many washings. 

Matt dislikes him on sight. 

"Wasn't sure if you were going to… but yeah, of course you'd stop by for a little Christmas… cheer. Yeah. Ho ho ho, right?" The dude shakes his head, sending bushy hair flying, then thrusts a sheaf of papers forward. "I've got that work-up you asked for!"

John's eyes drop to the stapled sheets. "Work-up?"

"Correlated by date and time, and cross-referenced to every incident involving interstate smuggling going back to 2000," the dude says. "I know you said just to go back to '03, but I figured the more data you have to look at the better conclusions you can reach. Oh, and the sticky tabs there? Those indicate occurrences involving suspected links to the Bertolucci crime family."

When John just stands there, it's Matt who reaches forward to take the thick stack of spreadsheets and print-outs. He fans through the sheets, raises a brow at the dense flow of data. Give him a couple of hours and he'd be able to see the patterns, but to John McClane this might as well be written in Greek. He eyes the newbie and amends his thought. Might as well be written in Klingon. "John?" he clips out.

"Sorry. Matt, this is Mike Farnsworth. My partner, Matt Farrell. Department took your advice and hired a cyber-tech." He glances at the print-out, then turns his attention back to the dude – Mike, he said – and shakes his head. "You did this already?"

Mike shrugs. "You said it was important."

"Jesus, kid, it's Christmas! Go take a load off. Make merry, eat some goddamn fruitcake or something."

Kid? Matt narrows his eyes. _Kid?_

"Fruitcake? You want me to… Detective McClane, no one actually _eats_ … did you know that fruitcake has been proven to be indigestible in the human body? Impervious to normal stomach acids! It just sits there in the colon, who knows what kind of damage it causes. Just picture that, Detective McClane!"

"I'm picturing it, all right." 

"Anyway, you said it was important, so…" He lifts a shoulder again, and the eyes that turn up to John's again shine just a little too brightly. Then they flick for a moment to Matt, and he watches as the dude licks his lips nervously. "It's all there, everything you… well, and if you need any help understanding any of it, just… I'm a phone call away. Or a walk. Across to my desk. And obviously you know where that is so I don't have to… okay. I'm gonna go get a drink now."

Matt watches the _kid_ flee across the room before handing the paperwork to John, who glances at it again before tossing it toward his desk.

"They let you hire a cyber-tech," he says.

"Only took a year of nagging, but yeah. Kid started two weeks ago."

Matt does his best not to bristle, he really does. He rubs at the back of his neck, eyes the dude across the room. "He talks a lot," he says.

"Ya think?"

"There was actually research done – this was in Aberdeen in '98, but it's since been recreated a couple of times – that shows that people that talk a lot usually have some kind of mental deficiency…" Matt crooks his fingers and shakes a hand next to his head. "Not that they're mentally challenged or anything, but they've got a bunch of circuits wired wrong up there, ya know? Can make them unstable. Prone to flights of fancy. Subject to delusional thinking, even. And that dude talks a _lot_. Did you notice that?"

"Can't say that I did."

"He never shut up!" Matt says. "How could you not notice?"

"Maybe I'm immune," John says dryly. 

Matt blinks. "Oh, hah, right, so you're saying that I—"

"I'm not saying anything," John says, "except that it's fuckin' Christmas Eve and I need a drink."

"Right," Matt says. He takes a breath. Around them the collected members of the JTTF and their friends and family are celebrating, and the last thing he needs is to start an argument with John in the middle of the squad room. Also, why would they argue? They have nothing to argue about. Just because John hired a young, geeky, long-haired, Star Wars shirt wearing research nerd with stars in his eyes who gets to hang around him at the office all day long does not mean… anything. At all. 

So he makes his way with John across the room and chats with Connie and gets introduced to the redhead and even tries the punch and most definitely does not stare daggers at Mike Farnsworth. Or make sure that he's standing close to John at all times. Or laugh a little too loudly at one of John's bad jokes.

And when, three plastic glasses of punch into the evening, John puts his arms around him and says, "For what it's worth, you're the only delusional-thinking, fancy-flying, motor-mouthed cyber-tech I'm interested in," Matt does not suddenly relax and breathe a sigh of relief. 

Or ramble on about how he had no worries in that regard anyway.

What he does say, once he's pressed his lips lightly against John's, is – "Stop calling him 'kid'."

"Got it."

"I'm going to have to explain to you what his report means."

"Kind of figured that."

"I love you," Matt says.

"Back atcha," John says. "Kid."


End file.
